What Ever Happened to Evangelism?

By James P. Long • 10/22/2012 l

I’m writing this from the pier in Oceanside, Calif., reflecting on a conversation that took place in such a similar setting 68 miles north of here on the Seal Beach pier. A conversation that changed my perspective of evangelism, a scene vividly recalled, replayed now as I write this years later.

At the time, I was deeply engaged with sane but aggressive evangelistic efforts throughout Southern California. Every Friday night, I was on Broadway in Los Angeles with a group of Christians, street preaching, playing guitar, sharing my testimony and explaining the Gospel to passers-by one-on-one.

I did the same every Saturday night on Hollywood Boulevard. Sunday afternoons, an associate and I conducted evangelistic children’s meetings at parks, on the Southern California beaches and in housing projects around L.A.

An Unforgettable Encounter

This one early summer afternoon, I had been dropped off at the Seal Beach pier with a guy a couple years younger whom I would spend the afternoon "mentoring," showing him how to cold-call share his faith.

We walked onto the pier, and I scanned the area for prospects—preferably students—who looked like they had time on their hands and might be open to conversation. The pier was oddly sparse, though I did notice an old guy in a blue windbreaker and white shorts, in his 70s I guessed, with white hair a bit long and wind-blown, his face weathered and sunburned. He was fishing and, I said to myself, so were we.

As we approached and greeted him, his face brightened. "Sure," he said, he "had a few minutes to talk." I remember thinking he probably lived alone and appreciated someone to talk to. But the mood changed as I was not more than a couple sentences into my spiel. He cut me off, midsentence, with his story.

"My wife and I were active in church. Real active. We never missed a service, and we volunteered whenever they needed a hand. Then my wife got sick. As her health failed, it became more and more difficult for her to get out, and people felt awkward around her—they didn’t know what to say—so gradually, they stopped coming around. The cancer advanced, but she lingered. The longer she was sick, the more alone we were. No one came, no one called." He paused, composing himself. "Then one day she died, and the church sent flowers."

He was trembling slightly, his face redder, his eyes moist.

"The church sent flowers." He repeated it, the words an indictment.

I was speechless, and my friend looked on helplessly. The awkward silence grew, yet I stood there, motionless, immobilized. I write this now through tears. In time I realized I had been looking down. I managed to raise my eyes, said, "I’m sorry," turned and walked away.

Flight of Faith

Years later I was on a packed flight from Washington, D.C., to Chicago. I had been assigned a center seat, toward the back of the plane near the roar of the engines. A co-worker took the window seat on my right and a young woman, a stranger named Denise, took the aisle seat on my left. As the plane taxied and then finally left the runway, Denise shared her story. She was returning home to Chicago to visit her young son who was being raised by her parents because of her addiction and consequent legal problems. She hoped one day to regain custody. If only there was a way to start over.

I recognized the coincidence of United’s seating assignment as a divine appointment, and for the next hour and a half, I talked about Jesus, listened to questions and misgivings, and read from a hardbound copy of the New Testament I had retrieved from my carry-on. I had, in fact, passionately tried to personalize the words of Paul for her, at one point taking out my pen and writing her name into my Bible so that Romans 6:23 read: "The wages of Denise’s sin are death, but the gift of God to Denise is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord." That same New Testament is open at my side as I write this.

I felt the descent of the plane as we settled into our approach to O’Hare. My pulse quickened. Time was running out. Would Denise respond? Would she pray the prayer before we landed, taxied to the gate and deplaned?

No, in fact, one flight-length conversation with a stranger was not enough.

The Piercing Question

There is little likelihood that someone in Denise’s circumstances will spontaneously decide to go looking for Jesus, who modeled for us a shepherd who did not wait for straying sheep to find their way home, but instead went out looking himself.

And what do we say to a lonely widower who feels abandoned and neglected by a church he once loved? Whose life is haunted, even years later, by one sad scene. "One day she died, and the church sent flowers."

Paul’s question should pierce us: "How can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard?" Yet I am convinced, as you are, that for evangelism to be optimally effective, the message needs to be presented in the context of long-term, loving relationship, authenticated by compassionate care as we walk the journey together. So what about those on the fringe, those who in the moment of greatest need we most easily neglect? Don’t we have an obligation to expand the circle of our relationships to include those with whom we may hold the least in common? Those we might otherwise fail through indifference, ineptitude or neglect?

What ever happened to evangelism? It became relationship, but somehow we must reach everyone. It became service, but it still cries out for words.

Christian Women

If spirituality were Olympic gymnastics, most Christian women would give their personal faith top scores. Three quarters of Christian women say they are mature in their faith (73%). The good feelings continue when it comes to ongoing spiritual growth, as more than one third (36%) of churchgoing women say they are “completely” satisfied with their personal spiritual development, and an additional 42% say they are “mostly” satisfied. Only one quarter (23%) of these women admit they are less than fully satisfied with their spiritual growth.

When it comes to their personal relationship with God, only 1% confess they are “usually not too close” or feel “extremely distant from God.” The vast majority of women claim to have an “extremely close” (38%) or a “pretty close” (43%) relationship with God. An additional 17% feel more ambivalent, saying they are “sometimes close and other times not close.” Perhaps this perception of intimacy with God is driven by the fact that slightly more than half (52%) of the women surveyed say they take time every day to intentionally evaluate the quality of their relationship with God.

Family Over Faith
Though women project a calm, confident exterior when it comes to their faith, the research suggests their spiritual lives are rarely their most important source of identity. That role is taken up by the strong priority Christian women place on family.

The preeminence of family was most overt for Christian women when it came to naming the highest priority in their lives. More than half (53%) say their highest priority in life is family. By contrast, only one third as many women (16%) rate faith as their top priority, which is less than the cumulative total of women who say their health (9%), career performance (5%) or comfortable lifestyle (5%) are top on their list of life objectives.

Despite the characterization of women as intricately connected to their peers, only 3% of Christian women say their friends are their top priority, equal to those who place finances (2%) and leisure (1%) at the top.

What a Woman Calls Herself
Women’s sense of identity very closely follows their priorities, with 62% of women saying their most important role in life is as a mother or parent. Jesus came next: 13% of Christian women believe their most important role in life is as a follower of Christ. In third place is their role as wife (11%).

Any other roles women identify with came in at similarly low rankings and far below that of a parent, including that of employee or executive (3%), that of church member (2%) and that of friend or neighbor (2%). American citizen, teacher and caregiver all rank with one percent each.

Goals in Life
Perhaps not surprisingly given where they place their identity, Christian women also point to family-related objectives as their most important goal in life. Raising their children well is the highest goal for Christian women (36%). While, roughly one quarter of Christian women identify faith-oriented goals as most important (26%).

Though women consider themselves family-driven, their marriages may be suffering from a lack of intentionality: only 2% of Christian women say their most important goal in life is to enhance their relationship with their significant other. Marriage comes in below several other goals, including health (6%), career (5%), lifestyle (4%), personal growth (4%), morality (4%) and financial objectives (3%). Only goals related to personal appearance, relationships outside the home and travel come in lower than marital goals.

Women Like Their Lives
Maybe one of the reasons women often fail to mention marriage-related goals is that they are generally quite satisfied in their marriages. While Christian women claim high levels of satisfaction in many facets of their life, they are most satisfied with their marriages (59%) followed by their parenting (51%). Although these findings cannot entirely explain women’s lack of marital goals, it does suggest many Christian women find some of their deepest contentment in life from their marriage.

Satisfaction levels drop somewhat when it comes to areas of life outside the home—particularly as they relate to serving people in the community (26% are completely satisfied with this area of their life) and to using their gifts and abilities (31% are completely satisfied). Personal spiritual development, career, relationships outside the family and involvement in church are all areas of life with which women are modestly satisfied.

Major Influencers
Most people recognize they are being influenced by outside forces—and in many cases, such influence is welcome, even invited. And then, of course, there are influences people would rather not admit affect them at all. Such is the case with the women surveyed. Christian women are more than willing to admit they are influenced by their faith—particularly through reading the Bible and listening to sermons, with 75% of those surveyed saying the Bible has influenced them “a lot,” and 51% saying the same about sermons. Most women also readily admit their husbands have an impact on their actions and decisions, with 63% of married women saying their husbands influence them a lot.

However, after those top three influencers, women are much more reticent to admit they are swayed by outside voices—particularly when it comes to friends and media. Only 10% of Christian women say their friends have a lot of impact on their decision-making (though 51% say their friends do have “some” influence on them). An even lower number of women will allow that the media has any influence on them, with only 5% admitting the media influences them a lot, 25% saying the media influences them some and a striking 70% claiming the media has “little” influence over their decision making.

What it Means
The president of Barna Group, David Kinnaman, offers this commentary on the research. “Some may interpret this research as a false choice: can women be asked to choose between their role as a parent and that of their faith? They see motherhood as core to what it means to disciple and be discipled. Others may conclude this study shows too many women have created an idol of their family, perhaps at the expense of their devotion to Christ.

"Between these extremes, perhaps these stats should help both moms and dads to consider the favorable—and potentially unfavorable—ways parenting has affected their faith journey. And church leaders, too, must wrestle with key questions: Has raising children and doing it well become central to the definition of being a good Christian? What happens to a mom who struggles in her role as a parent or to a woman who wants to but cannot become (or never becomes) a parent? Are these women somehow perceived as less Christian by fellow believers? Could a grace-based theology of faith in Christ be undermined if many Christians embrace a parallel works-based theology when it comes to their parenting? For church leaders and influencers the research underscores the complexity and importance of the God-given role of motherhood for millions of women."

When asked to explain why so few women say they are influenced by media, Kinnaman adds: “In many ways, women's self-perception revealed in this study seems to be aspirational. Women want to be influenced by the Bible, but they reject the idea of being heavily affected by the media. So these aspirations may be reflected in the numbers. Still, the way women describe themselves reveals something: they seem to know how they want to be perceived by others. Other findings in the survey reflect this pattern: women seem to be laying claim to a life they want, even if it’s not always current reality.”

What Your Teenager Doesn’t Want You to Know

It may not rot your teeth or send you out on secret late-night trips to purchase baggies full of some illegal substance, but porn addiction is a train wreck waiting to happen. And it looks like it’s a bigger problem for kids than we may want to admit.

I recently stumbled on an ABC Nightline report that aired earlier this year. It centers on a 17-year-old named Nathan Haug from Utah who just happens to look and act like an all-American kid. He has great grades, a great attitude and a great family. The only problem is, he’s been secretly hooked on porn for years. This average, clean-cut kid covered up his tracks on the family computer and even honed his naked pic searches to a measured science to keep his parents off the scent. But here’s the thing that got me: He’s been at it since he was twelve.

We parents may be cringing at the thought of our sweet kids dabbling in that junk. But it’s pretty obvious that Nathan’s situation is really pretty common. There’s a growing number of studies—like one from the University of New Hampshire called "The Nature and Dynamics of Internet Pornography Exposure for Youth"—that seem to suggest that kids often stumble onto this stuff and get hooked as young as 8 years old. The New Hampshire study found that 93.2 percent of its boy participants and 62.1 percent of its girls had been exposed to pornography, often well before they turned 18.

Some of us might be tempted to say, "Yeah, kids shouldn’t see that stuff too early, but it’s not really that big of a deal." But it is. Research shows that porn sets its hooks and creates all manner of issues in its victim’s lives. That constant buzz of artificial excitement tends to reshape people’s perspectives, causing them to be more depressed and/or isolated. When researchers from the American Psychological Association looked at the impact of regular porn use on relationships, they concluded that, "Exposure to narrow ideals of female attractiveness may make it difficult for some men to find an ‘acceptable’ partner or to fully enjoy intimacy with a female partner."

In other words, the porn-programmed mind expects sculpted perfection or nothing. And common sense will tell you what kind of warm-and-wonderful long-term relationships that will lead to.

The ABC report also mentioned a teen anti-porn movement called Fight the New Drug. It’s a group of young people taking some wise words of warning to high schools and teen groups all across the nation. On their site they mention that 70% of pornography is viewed between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m., when most people are generally at work or school. But here’s another tidbit the site shared that struck me:

The FBI’s statistics show that pornography is found at 80% of the scenes of violent sex crimes or in the homes of the perpetrators. 80 PERCENT! That’s 4/5ths of the pie! And that is just what they’ve found, what about the people who are Internet savvy and know how to cover their tracks?

Of course, that "cover up" part of the statement takes us back to Nathan Haug’s story, and it’s likely something repeated throughout America. A big part of today’s porn issue is how easy it is to find online and how easy it is to keep hidden away from any accountability-minded family members.

Are You Stressed or Depressed?

We all undergo stress at some point in our lives. Healthy stress acts like the fuel that moves us through the difficult times of life. It gives us motivation and keeps us from staying stagnant.

Stress is our body’s way of protecting us by sending chemicals that keep us alert, aware and focused in times of danger and need. You may have heard this commonly called the “fight or flight” response.

Stress isn’t all bad, and there is a healthy level of stress that is good—protecting us and keeping us functioning, giving us the energy we need for our daily responsibilities. But how does a person differentiate if what they are feeling is a product of the healthy stress response or if there is something more happening within?

Generally speaking, stress becomes problematic when it rises to a level beyond our control and begins to permeate other areas of life, overwhelming us and stunting us rather than helping us to function. Some signs that stress has reached the danger zone may include some or all of the following:
Difficulty sleeping or sleeping too much
Loss of appetite or overeating
Decreased energy
Loss of interest in things you once enjoyed
Feeling generally overwhelmed and hopeless
Difficulty concentrating
Feelings of guilt
Suicidal thoughts

If you’ve experienced some of the above symptoms that have lasted longer than two weeks during a season of stress, it’s a sign that it’s time to seek help. Because anxiety and depression many times go hand in hand, it’s important to tune inward and have an awareness of what is going on inside of us. Depression can be a paralyzing experience that can inhibit your ability to function through the normal everyday routine. It’s a dark cloud that can settle into the lives of Christians and non-Christians alike, taking over your thoughts and your feelings and sapping your strength.

The good news is that whether you are stressed or actually depressed, there is a way out. Sorrow may last for a night, but there is always hope for joy to come in the morning (Psalm 30:5). Talk to your doctor and seek professional counseling to combat the symptoms of your physical and emotional depression in the most effective way possible. Don’t allow the tentacles of depression to take hold of your life and bring you down.

Act quickly, and take the necessary steps to walk toward hope and healing.

adapted from Debra Felita

What Non-Christians Really Think About You

1. Christians are against more things than they are for.

“It just seems to me Christians are mad at the world and mad at each other. They are so negative, they seem unhappy. I have no desire to be like them and stay upset all the time.”

2. I would like to develop a friendship with a Christian.

“I’m really interested in what they believe and how they carry out their beliefs. I wish I could find a Christian who would be willing to spend some time with me.”

3. I would like to learn about the Bible from a Christian.

“The Bible really fascinates me, but I don’t want to go to a stuffy and legalistic church to learn about it. I would be nice if a Christian invited me to study the Bible in his home or at a place like Starbucks.”

4. I don’t see much difference in the way Christians live compared to others.

“I really can’t tell what a Christian believes because he doesn’t seem much different than other people I know. The only exception would be Mormons. They really seem to take their beliefs seriously.”

5. I wish I could learn to be a better husband/wife/dad/mom, etc., from a Christian.

“My wife is threatening to divorce me, and I think she means it this time. My neighbor is a Christian, and he seems to have it together. I am swallowing my pride and asking him to help me.”

6. Some Christians try to act like they have no problems.

“Harriett works in my department. She is one of those Christians who seems to have a mask on. I would respect her more if she didn’t put on such an act. I know better.”

7. I wish a Christian would take me to his or her church.

“I really would like to visit a church, but I’m not particularly comfortable going by myself. What is weird is that I am 32 years old, and I’ve never had a Christian invite me to church in my entire life.”

Do you see the pattern? Non-Christians want to interact with Christians. They want to see Christians’ actions match their beliefs. They want Christians to be real.

More Notes on our Job Reading

When we read God’s reply, we are tempted to summarized it as "I am God. You are not. Deal with it!"?

God’s opening words in this extended speech, and then the content of the speech itself, may point in a somewhat different direction. "Who darkens counsel?" God asks, (verse 2). The word translated "counsel" in Hebrew is "ey-tsah." There are two primary contexts in which this word appears in ancient Hebrew. One relates to the advice peers share (their counsel) when they are trying to help each other make a good decision. The other relates to the courtroom, where a judge provides the final word ("counsel") about what happened and what is to be done.

It is the latter that seems to apply here. Job has been asking all throughout the drama for the opportunity to meet God in court, for God to hear his complaint, and for God to respond to it. The rhetoric of God’s first response seems to indicate that that is exactly what God is doing in the chapters to follow. God has appeared. God is judge. And God will set the record straight.

What may seem like an endless barrage of almost taunting interrogations that follow in the next four chapters serves a different purpose. There may indeed be a bit of "rant" here, but this isn’t about God letting off steam. The God revealed here has no need to do so! Instead, rather than taunts, God’s questions are revelations. The questions God poses open up the hearers to the wonders of the earth and the universe (chapters 38-39) and to the extent of God’s power in human and heavenly affairs (chapters 40-41). The effect is not to bully Job into submission but to enlighten his "darkened counsel," not to subdue Job but to blow his mind — and, consequently, ours. It is not to assert superiority, but rather to help Job know God and God’s work more than he (or we) could have done before. The desired response is not cowering in terror or humiliation, but standing in awe.

When God deals with us, He seeks the same experience.

Job 23:1-9, 16-17 Notes

Job tells his "friends" he is earnestly seeking God, trusting that God will listen to his arguments that his suffering seems unjust. Despite his seeking, God appears absent or non-responsive. There are times we can all recognize with him.